About me

This blogname was derived from a satiric Arabic novel by the Palestinian Israeli Emile Habiby. In the ''The Secret Life of Saeed The Pessoptimist'' he uses absurdism as a weapon against the (ir)realities of daily life in Palestine/Israel. I consider it to be an example for how events in Israel/{Palestine best can be approached.
The subtitle is from a book by Dutch author Renate Rubinstein. In a way that is also still my motto.
My real name is Martin (Maarten Jan) Hijmans. I've been covering the ME since 1977 and have been a correspondent in Cairo. In 2018, I concluded the study 'Arabic language and culture' at the University of Amsterdam.
I started 'Abu Pessoptimist' in January 2009 out of anger about the onslaught of that month in Gaza. The other blog, The Pessoptmist, is meant to be a sister version in English. (En voor de Nederlandstaligen: ik wilde in november 2009 een tweede blog in het Engels beginnen en ontdekte te laat dat als je één account hebt, een profiel dan meteen ook voor allebei de blogs geldt. Vandaar dat het nu ineens in het Engels is... So sorry.)

Thursday, April 28, 2016

Palestinian writer, Rabai Al-Madhoun (70), is the winner of
the International prize for Arabic Fiction (the Arabic Booker
Prize) for his novel Destinies: Concerto of the Holocaust and the Nakba.
The announcement took place in an Abu Dhabi Hotel. In addition to winning $50,000, Rabai al-Madhoun is guaranteed an
English translation of his novel, as well as an increase in sales
and international recognition. The book is published by Maktabat Kul Shee (Haifa, Israel).
Al-Madhoun’s family came from Ashkelon, Palestine – now occupied by Israel – but went to the Gaza strip after the 1948 nakba exodus.
Leaving Gaza to attend Alexandria University, he later became involved
with the Palestinian liberation struggle as a member of the Democratic
Front for the Liberation of Palestine.He left activism in 1980 to focus on writing and has written a number
of works of fiction and non-fiction. This is the 70-year-old author’s
third novel.
His 2010 novel, The Lady from Tel Aviv, was shortlisted for
the 2010 International Prize for Arabic Fiction. It was also published in English in 2013 (Telegram Books) and won the
English PEN Writers in Translation award that year.

Tuesday, April 26, 2016

Saudi Arabia's cabinet has agreed on a broad-based economic reform
plan, known as Vision 2030, revealing how the oil-reliant state plans to
diversify its economy over the next 14 years.
Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the deputy crown prince, said on Monday
that the country was building up its public investment fund to become a
major player in global markets.
He said Saudi Arabia was restructuring its housing ministry to
increase the supply of affordable housing, and creating a "green card"
system within five years to give expatriates long-term residence.
Salman al-Ansari, founder and president of the Washington DC-based
Saudi American Public Relations Affairs Committee (SAPRAC), told Al
Jazeera the green card system gives more rights to expatriates to invest
in the country.
Saudi Arabia will also sell shares in state oil giant Aramco and set
up the world's largest wealth fund in line with the plan, Mohamed bin
Salman said separately in an interview with the Saudi-owned Al Arabiya
news channel.

More than
four-fifths of the U.S. Senate have signed a letter urging President
Barack Obama to quickly reach an agreement on a new defense aid package
for Israel worth more than the current $3 billion per year.Eighty-three
of the 100 senators signed the letter, led by Republican Lindsey Graham
and Democrat Chris Coons. Senator Ted Cruz, a 2016 presidential
candidate, was one of the 51 Republicans on board. The Senate's
Democratic White House hopeful, Bernie Sanders, was not among the 32 Democrats. "In light of Israel's
dramatically rising defense challenges, we stand ready to support a
substantially enhanced new long-term agreement to help provide Israel
the resources it requires to defend itself and preserve its qualitative
military edge," said the letter, which was first reported by Reuters.It
did not provide a figure for the suggested aid. Israel wants $4 billion
to $4.5 billion in aid in a new agreement to replace the current
memorandum of understanding, or MOU, which expires in 2018. U.S.
officials have given lower target figures of about $3.7 billion. They
hope for a new agreement before Obama leaves office in January.

Monday, April 25, 2016

Yemeni government troops and allies from a Saudi-led coalition have entered a city held by al-Qaeda for a year. Local Yemeni officials and residents told the Reuters new s agency on Sunday that some 2,000 Yemeni and Emirati troops advanced into Mukalla, taking control of its port and airport and setting up checkpoints throughout the southern city.
The coalition said in a statement,carried by the official Saudi news agency SPA, that "more than 800 al-Qaeda elements" had been killed and that the rest of the fighters had fled the city, the provincial capital of Hadramout.
The death toll could not be independently verified.And Iona Craig, a journalist who was in Mukalla last month and who said
she regularly communicates with residents there, described the coalition's claim as "ridiculous". "There weren't even 800 fighters left there," she told Al Jazeera by phone from the UK. "There was no fighting inside the city because
al-Qaeda had already left."

Jewish activists pushing for a third temple in Jerusalem attempted to ascend the Temple Mount carrying baby goats intended to be used as Passover sacrifices on Friday afternoon, as they do every year. Jerusalem police detained ten suspects in the Old City for interrogation, and seized four sacrificial goat kids.
Among those arrested were Kach activist Noam Federman from Hebron (who, as I Abu Pessoptimist, saw on the internet, is arrested every year for this reason the last couple of years), who attempts make the sacrifice every year, and Rafael Morris, an activist in the Temple Mount Faithful movement. The two were banned from entering Jerusalem before the holiday and will be questioned about breaching the ban.

Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Photo on social media of an overturned police car following the
shooting of three people by a policeman, killing one and
injuring two others.(Ahram Online).

A low-ranking Egyptian policeman shot three people in Egypt's New Cairo
on Tuesday following a quarrel, Al-Ahram Arabic news website reported,
killing one man and injuring two others.
Pictures and videos circulating on social media, apparently taken from
the scene in the Rehab neighbourhood, showed an overturned police van
with shattered windows.
Pictures of the corpse of the unidentified man killed were also circulated by social media users.

The interior ministry was not available for comment on the incident.
In February, a low-ranking policeman killed a driver in the
working-class Cairo district of El-Darb El-Ahmar, following a dispute
over a fare. In April a court sentenced the policeman to life in prison, one of the
harshest sentences issued to policemen convicted of similar violent
crimes. The sentence can still be appealed.

The Palestinian Authority is losing up to $285 million a year under
its current economic arrangements with Israel, the World Bank said on
Monday.
According to Ma’an News Agency, the global financial institution
announced the finding a day before it presents its full report to the Ad
Hoc Liaison committee, which decides on development assistance to the
Palestinian territories, in Brussels. It found that the current revenue
sharing arrangements as outlined by the Paris Protocol — through which
Israel collects VAT, import taxes and other revenues on behalf of the PA
— “have not been systematically implemented.”
The World Bank estimated that “tax leakages on bilateral trade with
Israel and undervaluation of Palestinian imports from third countries”
amounted to up to $285 million in revenues lost annually by the PA.It added that the amount could be higher, as it was unable to make
estimates for Area C — the 61 percent of the occupied West Bank under
full Israeli control — “due to data constraints.”

Sunday, April 17, 2016

Hundreds rallied in central Baghdad on Sunday in
support of powerful Shi'ite Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr who has
threatened to call mass protests if the prime minister fails to name a
new cabinet to fight corruption by Tuesday. People
in Tahrir Square on Sunday said many more would join them if Prime
Minister Haider al-Abadi did not select a government mainly made up of
technical experts to tackle what they see as widespread graft and
mismanagement."Yes, yes to Iraq; no, no to corruption," they chanted, carrying Iraqi flags.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi's presented on 31 March a list of new
ministers in keeping with a deadline set by the legislature earlier in the week, which was underscored by a ''sit in'' in the Green Zone by Moqtada al-Sadr personally. The list was made up of independent professionals
who he hoped could free their ministries from the grip of dominant
political groups that have built their influence and wealth on a system
of patronage put in place since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Tuesday, April 12, 2016

Egypt's announcement during a five-day visit by King Salman that it would transfer two Red Sea islands to its Saudi ally has outraged Egyptians, who took to social media to criticize the move, which now faces a legal challenge.The Egyptian
government said in a statement on Saturday that the two countries had signed maritime demarcation accords that put the islands of Tiran and Sanafir in Saudi waters, a process it said had taken six years.
Earlier, on Friday, after a meeting with Egyptian presidnt Abdel fattah al-Sisi, King Salman announced that a bridge connecting Egypt and Saudi Arabia would be built across the Red Sea. No details were given. Also Saudi Arabia is expected to sign a $20 billion deal to finance Egypt's oil needs for the next five years and a $1.5 billion deal to develop its Sinai region, two Egyptian government sources told Reuters.
Saudi and Egyptian officials said about the the islands thatb they belong to the kingdom and were only under Egyptian control because Saudi Arabia's founder, Abdulaziz Al Saud, asked Egypt in 1950 to protect them.

Saturday, April 9, 2016

Italy recalled
its ambassador to Egypt for consultations on Friday after Egyptian
investigators in Rome failed to provide evidence needed to solve the
mystery of the murder of an Italian student in Cairo. Ambassador
Maurizio Massari was called to the capital for "an urgent evaluation"
of what steps to take to "ascertain the truth about the barbaric murder
of Giulio Regeni", the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.Egyptian
authorities met with Rome prosecutors on Thursday and Friday, handing
over some, but not all, of the evidence Italy had requested. The
prosecutors said in a statement Egyptian investigators had still not
handed over such evidence as details from Cairo cell towers that had
connected to Regeni's mobile phone. Regeni,
28, vanished from the streets of Cairo on Jan. 25. His body was
discovered in a ditch on the outskirts of the Egyptian capital on Feb.
3, showing signs of extensive torture. Regeni's
mother said last week that her son's body had been so disfigured that
she had only been able to recognize him by the tip of his nose. Human rights groups
have said the torture indicates he was killed by Egyptian security
forces, an allegation Cairo has repeatedly denied.

Tuesday, April 5, 2016

Alaa Mubarak, the son of former
President Hosni Mubarak, is among the global political figures whose
financial dealings were exposed in the “Panama Papers,” a document leak said to be the largest in the history of journalism.
More
than 11 million documents were leaked from Panamanian law firm Mossack
Fonseca, which sells offshore companies to customers around the globe.
The leaked documents show how the firm helped clients dodge taxes,
launder money and evade sanctions. German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung,
which originally received the documents, shared them with a team of
journalists from around the world in cooperation with the International
Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).